But you say 'if it's not allowed', but not allowed by whom?
The courts aren't some kind of magic guarantors of justice and order, and something isn't okay just because the courts approve it. If this somehow is tolerated by the courts, the fact that we have them is irrelevant.
It's the policy itself that determines whether we are like North Korea.
"But you say 'if it's not allowed', but not allowed by whom?"
Not allowed by EU law obviously. Role of courts (in general) is interpreting law and thus deciding how said laws apply case by case. Law in EU flows down from EU treaties that where negotiated and signed by member countries. The big ones (treaties) needed also be "ratified" by country wide referenda.
My interpretation of parent comment is that, we shouldn't be just "themwashing" these powers, and start placing them under technical scrutiny more often.
So laws are made by people, sometimes retired people, sometimes people.
So it's just another thing allowed by a person. Law isn't something magical with capability to make something not okay okay. Law is just someone allowing or forbidding something, with this having been incorporated into a sort of system.
I don't know exactly what you mean, since we have a representative democracy and since the governments enter the treaties and have strong influence over many parliaments it's really is very person focused in the end, even though it really shouldn't be.
A sensible world would have lots of referendums with the general public approving or disapproving of parliamentary decisions, à la Switzerland, but that is not the world we live in.
I do not feel heartened by this sentence, even though I should be. We're choosing from a pre-curated menu rather than truly "hiring" representatives. The real power lies with party gatekeepers, donors, and institutional barriers that determine who even makes it onto the ballot, not with voters making the final selection. It's more like being asked to pick your favorite from two restaurants that a food critic already chose for you, rather than having genuine choice over where to eat.
and it's not incredibly practical. Instead those sit at the head of institutions, whether political parties, governments, etc. have real power.
It's a bit like saying 'so make your own Facebook', but that's pretty useless if it's a response to someone who feel that some big social media company is influencing public discourse and harming proponents of certain ideas.
You can't make your own Facebook, or organize a political party other than in response to slow phenomena, and here we're talking about something has until recently been seen as literally illegal-- against the founding principles of the EU, so this is a huge, sudden change which people have no chance of resisting in a representative system.
You are basically chosen by parties and other entrenched organizations. New parties are very unusual.
However, none of that really matters. Democracy, laws, etc. don't make this kind of anti-privacy policy more legitimate. If you create a STASI, it doesn't matter if you do so democratically, and that really is what we are talking about.
With software on your phones controlled by others going through your stuff you have a beyond-STASI-surveillance level.
The previous proposals ran into basic human rights issues. Changing laws related to those tends to be a lot harder than just passing jet another surveillance bill. Of course it still isn't perfect since those can be bypassed by "restricting" the use of the data to specific cases and then just ignoring the restrictions once the systems are in place.
The courts aren't some kind of magic guarantors of justice and order, and something isn't okay just because the courts approve it. If this somehow is tolerated by the courts, the fact that we have them is irrelevant.
It's the policy itself that determines whether we are like North Korea.